


Paper Moon

by wocket



Category: John Mulaney - Fandom, Oh Hello - Kroll & Mulaney, Real Person Fiction, US Comedians RPF
Genre: Blind Item, Coming Out, F/M, M/M, OT3, Paparazzi, Threesome, Twitter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-12
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-10-17 07:40:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20617403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wocket/pseuds/wocket
Summary: When a paparazzo snaps a racy photo of John Mulaney and Nick Kroll, life gets complicated.





	Paper Moon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sinnerinsecret](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinnerinsecret/gifts), [Meital](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meital/gifts).

“We fucked up,” Nick says.

John looks up from his book. “What’s the matter with you?”

Nick tosses a magazine to him. “Read this.”

John reads the blind item out loud. “_These two funny men were spotted in a long embrace after the Gotham Awards. Their chemistry is on fire! The young men couldn’t keep their hands off each other._ That could be anyone! ‘Two comedians with chemistry’?”

“Oh yeah? Who?”

“Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson. Seth Rogen and James Franco. Martin Short and Steve Martin.”

“It says young.” Nick narrows his eyes. “Wait, you think Steve and Marty are fucking?”

“I would count on it,” John says. Nick thinks about it then nods.

“How’d I miss that one?”

“Open your eyes, Nick. Anyway, we need to be more careful. This means someody saw us.”

“Good thing it's a _blind item_, Mulaney.”

*

The blind item article comes and goes with minimal impact, so they forget about it and move on with their lives.

Nick surprises John after one of his stand-up shows, arriving in the green room with a grin and a hug.

It’s easy to let Nick talk him into making out after John’s show when his adrenaline is still high. Nick pulls John outside for a “cigarette break” and pins John against the brick wall with familiar hands for a kiss that leaves them both flushed, hair askew. Nick gets handsy when he’s drunk, and most of the time, John loves it. His mouth is warm on John's, his hand firm and solid where he's pressing John against the wall.

The flash of a camera startles them, interrupting their kiss, and Nick lets go of John’s jacket, blinking rapidly.

“Shit,” Nick says, realizing a photographer must have followed them outside, but the alley is empty before either one of them knows what’s happening.

*

Nick has a Google Alert set for his own name, and his stomach drops when he sees the post the next morning.

_ **COMEDIANS JOHN MULANEY AND NICK KROLL CAUGHT TICKLING EACH OTHER’S FUNNY BONES ** _

Nick screenshots the headline and sends it to John.

Nick can’t help reading the headlines even though John tries to ignore them, and he relays all of the worst parts to John throughout the day. Nick notices not a single publication using the word bisexual, and none of them seem to understand the word polyamory, either. It’s missing from their vocabulary, all of them spinning what they saw into some kind of gay affair designed to ruin John’s heterosexual marriage.

Nick prepares for Anna to hate him, though not for any of the reasons listed in the magazines. It hurts his heart to think about.

After putting on an old jacket, a baseball cap, and a pair of chunky sunglasses, Nick takes an Uber to Johns’s apartment, where he has an open invitation. He prays not to be recognized.

Anna opens the door of the Mulaney-Tendler apartment before Nick can pull out his key, and Nick doesn’t see any hatred on her face, just resolve. Anna tugs Nick into the apartment and gives him a solid hug before fixing him a cup of coffee.

“How are you doing?” Anna asks him, watching him sit down on their sofa.

“I should be asking you that,” Nick responds, miserable. “I’m so fucking sorry,” he blurts.

Anna sits down next to Nick on the sofa, taking the mug from his hands and setting it on the coffee table. “You don’t have to be sorry,” she pauses and swallows. “It’s unfortunate.”

“That’s one way to put it,” Nick moans. “This is a disaster,” Nick insists. “I fucked this up. I’ve fucked my career, and I’ve fucked John’s —”

Anna takes Nick’s hand. “You didn’t fuck anything up.”

Nick looks down at Anna’s tiny hand in his. He tries to avoid letting the headlines getting to his head.

“John will be home soon,” she says. “Come here.”

Nick leans his head against Anna’s shoulder, letting her calm his reeling nerves.

Sure enough, it’s not long before John gets back, tension in his shoulders and a creased brow. He drops his keys on the counter and strips off his suit jacket, folding it neatly over the back of a chair.

John approaches the sofa and bends down, kissing his wife hello before bending down to kiss Nick, too. He sits down on the other side of Nick, silent.

“Well, you two are fun today,” Anna says, breaking the silence.

Nick can feel the tension in John’s body where he’s pressed up against him, and Anna can feel the tension in the air.

Nick squeezes John’s knee, unsure what to say. John closes his eyes and leans back against him.

“Hon,” Anna says, and both men look at her. “I’m starting to worry about you.”

“I always dreamed of having my name in the headlines but not like this,” Nick laments. “Do you know any lawyers?” Nick jokes to John, but it’s too soon.

“Oh _no_,” John groans, thinking immediately of his parents. Somehow America’s reaction hadn’t prepared him for theirs.

“Fuck,” Nick says, when the reality of his own joke settles in for him, too. “I finally turned off notifications and shut my phone off. I haven’t even really thought that far ahead.”

“What did Mike think?” Anna presses gently. John’s just returned from an emergency meeting with his manager.

“Nothing that seemed encouraging,” John admits. He runs a hand through his brown hair. “We’re breaking new ground.”

“I don’t like the sound of that.”

Anna strokes her thumb over Nick’s hand. “What did he have to say?” she asks John.

“He said, _are you sure you don’t want to deny this_ and _this is going to be hard to explain, you understand that, right, Mulaney?_”

“Is that all?” Anna asks.

John continues. “_People don’t like what they don’t understand… If you’re lucky, they’ll think this is a joke…_”

Nick shuts his eyes.

“What comes next?” Anna asks.

“Damage control,” John answers. “Call my lawyers - parents - in the morning and figure out next steps.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Nick agrees. He starts to get up to leave, but before Nick can get very far, John tugs at Anna’s hand, looking to her with a searching eye. She nods, and John calls out to Nick.

“Stay, Nick,” John tells him. They pull him back down to the sofa between them.

Nick stays.

*

When Nick wakes up the next morning in John and Anna’s bed (already naked from last night), he feels his morning wood pressing against John’s bare thigh.

John’s already awake and looking at him through sleepy eyes.

Nick crawls on top of John, pressing kisses to his neck. John winds an arm around Nick’s waist and gives him a deep, slow kiss. Drowsy and quiet, they make out, grinding their hips together with a lazy force.

Anna has started to stir. She turns on her side and props her head up on her hand, watching Nick kiss her husband. Her usual grumpy morning face turns into an interested smile.

Interrupted, Nick looks guilty, like he’s been caught in the act - which, well, he has.

“By all means,” Anna says coyly. “Be my guest.”

Anna watches as Nick returns to kissing her husband, pressing his plush lips against John’s.

Nick kisses John’s jawline, holding his mouth beside John’s ear and speaking in a voice so low only John could hear. “How about I make you forget all this press nonsense?”

John nods enthusiastically.

Nick gives him another kiss and starts working his way down John’s chest. Moving lower and lower, he takes John’s cock into his mouth, sliding his tongue around the tip at first, then taking him deeper.

Nick takes his time sucking John off, making sure to incorporate all of John’s favorite tricks.

Anna leans over and gives John a kiss while Nick works his tongue over John’s cock. John reaches into her long brown hair to pull her closer, moaning into her mouth when Nick makes a particularly skillful move. She motions toward Nick with a wink.

“Nick,” John murmurs after a while. He taps his head gently. “I’m supposed to remind you to share.”

Nick comes up for air. He moves over to Anna, kissing his way from her knee up to her thigh. He spreads her legs and starts to eat her out.

John jerks himself off watching Nick lick his wife’s pussy.

“Harder, Nick,” John commands, delighted.

Nick buries his face inside Anna, pressing his tongue inside her as teasingly as possible. She arches up underneath his touch.

John encourages the both of them until he sees Anna squirm underneath Nick’s hands. She starts to whimper, which Nick takes as instruction to press harder.

Spurred on by the sounds of his wife’s moans, John works his hand faster, pumping into his fist until he spills all over his hand.

John can see his wife twisting underneath Nick and his efforts to please her. He takes Anna’s chin and kisses her through her orgasm.

“You need a hand?” Nick asks John, a little disappointed when he sees that John’s already come but pleased that he enjoyed the show.

“Just a kiss,” John says affectionately.

Nick takes his place beside John so he can oblige.

John hates to leave Nick hanging, so he kneels over his friend to return the favor. He looks up every so often, eyes big and desperate for feedback, for approval, and Nick just slides a hand into his hair and tells him what a good job he’s doing. John doesn’t need much advice, though, Nick thinks he’s fucking perfect.

“You’re perfect,” he accidentally says out loud, and then he’s coming down John’s throat.

John kisses Nick’s belly before hoisting himself up for a real kiss.

The three of them share kisses between each other until they lean back on the pillows, sated and sleepy.

By the time John has energy to reach for his iPhone again, the extraordinary number of missed calls and text messages has almost doubled since yesterday.

John’s phone starts to buzz again. He sits up to reach over his wife and check the screen. The call is from his lawyer - his _mother_ \- and he groans, tossing it back onto the bedside table. Nick’s cellphone vibrates beside John’s.

John lays back down in bed between Nick and Anna.

“I should have expected this eventually,” John admits, “but it feels _awful_.”

“The worst part about this whole thing is that people are going to think I’m some kind of side piece,” Nick complains. “What if people think you’re cheating on Anna? What if people think it’s a joke?”

“You sound like me,” John tells him. _Fuck it_, John decides, reaching for his iPhone. He opens up Twitter and starts writing.

John looks to his wife, but she shrugs. “Everything is speculation at this point,” he says, defending his choice. They’d end up giving interviews about this, no doubt, and they could address the “_situation_” between the three of them more appropriately - a situation John was still trying to wrap his head around.

“Let me see,” Nick begs, taking the phone from John’s hands. “Nice. A campaign from ten years ago,” he comments sarcastically.

“It’s not exactly like we’ve been given instructions for how to officially do this,” John replies, “or a choice. Do I attach the picture?”

Nick watches as he hits the button to post the Tweet. “Should I just retweet yours? Or do my own?” Nick asks. “How do you explain us in 140 characters or less?”

John puts down his phone, and it starts to buzz immediately with responses to his Tweet. He doesn’t look. He can’t; not yet.

Anna leans her head on John’s shoulder.

“What do we do now?” Nick asks, sliding closer to John.

“Hope for the best, expect the worst,” Anna answers.

John reaches for them both at the same time, taking their hands in his own. “We’ll figure everything out. Together.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for your encouragement, Meital!


End file.
